


All These Things Inside

by poisontaster



Series: Every Broken Thing [15]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Panic Attacks, Secret Relationship, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-04-26
Updated: 2006-04-26
Packaged: 2018-05-10 14:09:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5589079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poisontaster/pseuds/poisontaster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set after "Dead Man's Blood".  If you'd asked him, Dean would have been sure he'd be the first to break.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All These Things Inside

If you'd asked him, Dean would've been sure he'd be the first to break.

He's the one with split knuckles and the one who's only sleeping about three hours a night—if that. He's the one who hasn't eaten hardly anything in days, while Sam and Dad bicker and squall over bacon and egg breakfasts, lunch's meatloaf sandwiches, and fried chicken dinners.

He's the one who's wound up like a guitar string, while Sam coasts on his usual mix of brood, snark and steely anger.

Which is why it's such a mind fuck when it turns out to be Sam that gives way, after all.

"I just keep thinking," Sam says out of the blue one night, "what if he dies?"

He's whispering. All their conversations seem to be in whispers these days. Dean's stomach clenches a little tighter and he looks up from his hand scribbled notes without saying anything.

Sam's on the edge of the nearer bed, head down and his hands knotted together restlessly between his knees. His hair obscures everything except the tip of his nose and the point of his chin, making his expression impossible to read.

"I just…I think part of me would be _relieved_. And then…then I feel so sick and awful for thinking like that, for feeling like I have to… _trade him_ to have you and for…for wanting you so much that I'm…I'm almost…" Sam buries his face in his hands, whole body shaking like he'll vibrate apart.

Dean drops his journal and pen and shoves out of the chair in a rush, both arms. He kneels at Sam's feet and locks his hands hard over Sam's arms. "Stop," Dean says, his voice rough and ugly. He shakes Sam a little. "Stop it. _Stop it._ "

He doesn't want to hear this. He doesn't want to _hear_ this, especially when it's all he hears in his own head all the time. And that's bad enough. But to actually _say_ all these traitorous thoughts, let them loose in the air to fly and do as they might…

Sam's head comes up, hands falling to grip Dean hard at the elbow. He's gasping, choking, like he can't get enough air into his lungs. His pupils are huge pits into blackness. "I just… We have to tell him, Dean, we gotta tell him, I can't, I can't…" He bows in half, struggling for enough air to breathe and shrugging Dean off him. "We have to tell him."

"Not gonna happen," Dean says grimly, though he reaches to run a hand down Sam's back, off-center, so as not to trigger Sam's erogenous zone.

Sam doggedly shakes his head and all at once, he stands, pushing Dean back onto his ass. Dean flounders for only a second before he's rolling up, getting in between Sam and the door and shoving Sam back hard. He pushes Sam all the way across the room, manhandling him into the bathroom—the furthest point from the shared wall between their room and Dad's—and slamming him up against the tile.

He wants to shout. He wants to cuss and yell and maybe hit something. Not Sam, but something. But that's not the tool needed for this job. So instead, he holds Sam in place with his body and elbows and puts a hand to either side of Sam's head, threaded through the long mop of Sam's hair.

Sam's crying now; not girly, but like he can't help it, water falling from his eyes and his chest hitching still with the inability to breathe. "What if he dies?" Sam murmurs, his forehead falling forward to Dean's. "What if _you_ die, and I'm…I'm all alone? I can't…" Sam chokes, hands clutching so hard he's going to leave marks. "It's all…it's all gone, and I can't…"

"Shh…" Dean's thumbs press into the skin behind Sam's ears, massaging, triggering pulse points, trying to make the hard knots in Sam's shoulders ease. "Shh…"

"I can't…" Sam takes a breath, tearing, sobbing. "Oh fuck, Dean, I can't _do_ this anymore…"

Dean's skin goes cold and he feels panic welling up in his own throat, but his hysterics can come later. Or, you know, never. So what he says is, "You can. Sam, you _can_. C'mon now…we're so _close_ ; to getting that thing. The thing that took Mom, that took _Jess_ …you can't just punk out now. Are you a fucking Winchester or what?"

 _"What if he doesn't die?"_ Sam hisses, his face white and desperate, eyes lunatic. "What if he doesn't die and this is what it's always going to be? I said I wouldn't leave; I told myself and I told you and I…I _meant_ it, Dean, but I… I can't be his little boy. I can't, I can't…" Sam starts to slide down the wall, wheezing and making those choked off little gasps. His lips are a little blue and Dean's starting to get scared.

He catches Sam and pulls him close, taking the weight of them both. "Shh," he says again. "Shh…" He runs his fingers over Sam's back, up and down; a cheat, but one he knows will make Sam relax. "Breathe, just…just breathe, Sam…"

Sam shudders and lets out a noise halfway between a sob and a moan, his face burrowing deeper into Dean's shoulder. His hands let go of their death grip and slide down around Dean's waist where they tighten again.

Dean lets his mind empty and his mouth run on in stupid nonsense, consumed by this, his oldest of duties—the care of Sam. It's easy, and it's familiar and comfortable and in all his vistas of unhappiness, it's still just feels right.

"I can't go back, Dean," Sam says into Dean's shirt, muffled and broken. "I can't go backwards, I just…"

"I know," Dean says. He lips the hard curve of Sam's ear, the curled up ends of Sam's hair tickling his mouth. "Sam—"

He wants to say all manner of reassuring things. But the truth is that he sucks at that shit. And the other truth is that he has little to offer in the way of reassurance. Dean's followed their dad through a lot more hell and high water than Sam ever did and he's never seen Dad flinch. But this demon, this inhuman _thing_ that stole and twisted their life…

Dean looks into Dad's eyes and he sees fear.

Not that it'll make Dad—hell, any of them—back down, but it doesn't mean they've got a great life expectancy either. Dad knows it, Dean knows it and Sam knows it. And Dean knows better than to try and tell Sam otherwise, because there are lies you can make Sam believe and ones you can't, and it's Dean's job to know the difference.

But if he's hampered in his ability to lie, there are other things Dean can do.

"C'mon," he says suddenly, disentangling Sam's hands from his shirtsleeves and twining his fingers through Sam's. "Put your shoes on; let's go."

Sam digs his heels in, but it's halfhearted. Another tug and he's following Dean back into the main room. "Go where? Dean…"

Dean picks up the phone and dials Dad's room. "Me and Sam are going to the bar," he informs Dad when he picks up the phone, and hangs up again before Dad can offer a response or decide to come.

Halfway through tying his shoes, Sam looks up at Dean. "The bar? Dean…"

Sam's expression starts to close again; Dean goes to him and splays his finger through Sam's unruly hair again, fingertips rubbing over the scalp and then down the line of Sam's neck. Sam's eyes half close and he leans into the touch.

"Just a change of scenery," Dean says. "Get us the hell out of here for a while. C'mon…how often do I ask you to trust me?"

Sam gives him an incredulous look. "You ask me all the time!"

He sounds more like himself and Dean's grin is a little less forced than it might otherwise be. "Yeah, but this time I _mean_ it."

Sam rolls his eyes, but he scrubs his face hard with the cuff of his over shirt and goes back to tying his shoes.


End file.
